I am trying to trace my grandfather and grandmother's ancestry James Moyles and Mary Devine. I have now ascertained from one of their children's birth certificates namely Frances Moyles (mispelled as Myles throughout the registration document) that my grandfather James was a farmer(believed to have farmed land at Carrabagan with his brother Richard (only found out this information last week from an elderly cousin who I have managed to trace)) and his place of residence was Carrabagan and Frances was born on 20th June 1895 and the birth was registered on 16th July 1895 in the Superintendent Registrar's District of Ballina in the County of Mayo & Sligo and signed by Geo M Laing, Registrar. Can anyone out there shed any more light on this for me please. Carrabagan keeps popping into the equation at every turn therefore I have to assume it has to be on some old map somewhere in County Mayo. Any help would be greatly appreciated and please feel free to email me direct at Christine4818@aol.com The other suggestions I have had are that through time the name has changed from Carrabagan to Corravegaun East or Corravegaun West as listed on 1901 Census and from which my grandmother's parents Patrick and Ellen Devine are listed and also in the same area there are Moyles but as I do not know my grandfather's parents first names, I cannot at this time link them together. The Irish naming tradition does seem to have continued in the Moyles family and also the fact that there are Devines and Moyles in the same area leads me to suspect that there is a strong possibility that this is the correct area. The problem is that until I can actually establish the parish I cannot trace either of my grandparents baptisms nor any of their five children born in Ireland. Anyone else got any suggestions no matter how trivial

My friend John is correct. Your family were in Correveggaun in Ballynahaglish parish in 1901 and I think some of your Moyles are still around Ballycastle; see the Irish phonebook on this site. Tell 'em a couple of Roscommon men sent ya!

"Carrabagan" should be Corraveggaun and it's all the Brits fault. See the play "Translations" by Brian Friel and you'll see. The 'B' in Carrabagan should be a "B" with a dot over it giving it a "V" sound as there is no letter V in Gaelic. Next, the last "A" in Carrabagan had an accent over it giving it a "long A" sound, thus the ending "an" sounds like "awn" or "aun." The first part "Carra" is just interchangeable with "Corra." Either one means a swampy place or a type of marsh. There's lots of that in Mayo. If you have MS Word, you can probably see these letter accents under "Symbols" on the Insert menu.

The Backs parish listing includes some births and marriages for Currabagan townland.

The LDS have filmed some records for Back RC pariah.

You can use LDS records to trace change of occupier of land from c1854 Griffith’s Valuation to c1920.

Check your local library for “Tracing Your Irish Ancestors”, by John Grenham. It will show the location of Backs Catholic parish and LDS film numbers

Good luck,

John

Hi John

Thank you very much indeed for the information and the links, all of which I found very helpful indeed. I have passed the info to my friends at Irishrelatives.com and hopefully given the fullness of time we will be able to trace my ancestors.
With kindest regards frae Bonnie Scotland
Christine
Lang May Yer Lum Reek

My friend John is correct. Your family were in Correveggaun in Ballynahaglish parish in 1901 and I think some of your Moyles are still around Ballycastle; see the Irish phonebook on this site. Tell 'em a couple of Roscommon men sent ya!

"Carrabagan" should be Corraveggaun and it's all the Brits fault. See the play "Translations" by Brian Friel and you'll see. The 'B' in Carrabagan should be a "B" with a dot over it giving it a "V" sound as there is no letter V in Gaelic. Next, the last "A" in Carrabagan had an accent over it giving it a "long A" sound, thus the ending "an" sounds like "awn" or "aun." The first part "Carra" is just interchangeable with "Corra." Either one means a swampy place or a type of marsh. There's lots of that in Mayo. If you have MS Word, you can probably see these letter accents under "Symbols" on the Insert menu.

Hi Sean

Thank you for your posting and for the lesson regarding the use of symbols and how they can be misconstrued. Until this lesson, I was beginning to think I was imagining that I had got it all wrong somewhere along the line...lol (mind you knowing me you would in all probability say ....nothing unusual there then)

Thanks for the information on Richard Moyles and family. I'm inclined to go with the second one Thomas Moyles as I can find no trace of a John Moyles in the family. My own father was called Thomas Moyles and none of his siblings were called John and in the main my Moyles family seem to have retained the Irish naming tradition.

I also have no doubt though that the first Richard Moyles is in fact related in some way to my family and I know that in helping a Moyles in PA trace his family history that his grandfather was called Richard Moyles and he emigrated to the US some time before 1898 and his parents were called John and Honora. Richard married a Margaret Newcomb but I was unable to ascertain whether this occurred prior to him leaving for the US although I did trace and Mr and Mrs R Moyles on the US Passenger List for 1896.

Thank you again Ed for responding to my posting and I have no doubt our paths will cross again some time on the Notice Boards.
Till then take care and God Bless
Warmest wishes
Christine